Libertarian Party presidential nominee and former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson said he’s no skeptic of man-made global warming and endorsed a “fee” on carbon dioxide emissions.

“I do believe that climate change is occurring,” Johnson said. “I do believe that it is man-caused” and “that there can be and is a free-market approach to climate change.”

Johnson’s “free market” approach to global warming includes “a fee — not a tax, he said — placed on carbon” to make those who emit the greenhouse gas pay the supposed cost of their actions, according to the Juneau Empire.

28 comments:

While it is clear that Johnson is not really libertarian in anything but name, it is also important to remember that the free-market doesn't solve all problems.

Even ones it addresses better than any other system.

Human stupidity is one such problem. In a free-market, you still have both the problem of people choosing to pursue stupid ends while refusing to acknowledge the consequences and of people being tricked into believing in 'consequences' that have not and cannot occur. A free-market does leave people far more liable for the consequences of their own actions, and this makes it harder for people to be habitually and willfully stupid. But habitual, willful stupidity is not the only kind of stupidity there is. Actual, legitimate mental incapacity is not merely habit nor is it willful. Libertarians generally don't discuss this enough, because...well, habitual and willful stupidity, I guess.

But a free-market also fails to ensure that arbitration mechanisms for redress of harms won't be stupid on occasion, particularly when dealing with accusations of causing 'harm' to a commons that cannot be readily privatized, like the atmosphere. Everyone needs to breathe, no humans make oxygen, and the level of understanding of meteorology necessary to make a reasonable assessment of whether someone is really damaging the atmosphere is...not as general as either of those, but much closer to something nobody has than something everyone does.

In fact, the total numbers on CO2 released into the atmosphere are so staggering as to make all human action, both in releasing and drawing down carbon, utterly trivial. This is not to say that we shouldn't keep an eye on the situation, or that burning down entire continents has no bad effects, or that it would be impossible in principle for a world population of a few trillion to need to carefully balance CO2 release and draw-down (though by that time it might be more practical just to have everyone be responsible for their private air supply as well as insisting they not alter the atmosphere generally). It is not to say that there are no other pollutants that have more severe effects on the ability of people to use the atmosphere as a breathable resource. Rather, a careful view of the available evidence and some calculation reveals that carbon taxes (or 'fees', a thorn by any other name) and credits are entirely disproportionate to any actual harm or benefits associated with human action affecting atmospheric CO2.

But people can be fooled, including whoever you put in charge of arbitrating claims that someone is damaging the atmosphere by releasing 'too much' or 'more than their fair share' of CO2. Having a free-market wouldn't change this. A genuine free-market libertarian could be wrong about it too.

Infiltrate, divide, disrupt, destroy. The National Libertarian Party is fully compromised. I'm voting Constitution party this year. I have a few problems with some of their social issue ideas, but, Darrell Castle is a far superior candidate to Gary Johnson.

It seems Gary Johnson became the typical mainstreamer towards the beginning of this election cycle. Everything out of his mouth, not just the CO2 issue, sounds like someone jumping on the globalist/NWO bandwagon. What caused him to flip like this, I don't know. I even voted for him in 2012. Now he's against anything the Libertarian Party stood for just a few years ago. Gun control, TTP, open borders, you name it, this guy's now going along with it. How the Libertarian Party is standing for this I have no idea

Gary Johnson is the LiberaLtarian candidate. Many many years ago, the two "main" parties saw the Liberty Movement rising. They saw that We The People were growing weary of their antics. They had to act, in unison (ironically) or as they call it - 'Bi-Partisanly" to counteract this threat they saw from the body politic.

Their fear was that Individual Liberty would finally overcome the two party theme, that folks would assemble together aside from their two party game. They wanted to keep the people divided, rather than see them assemble together. A central idea of what is the libertarian mindset is "you do your thing, and I will do my thing, you don't mess with me and I don't mess with you. We might not agree on what to do or not do, but we respect each other on the level that matters - you have your choice and I have mine. The fact is - the vast majority of Americans agree with this mindset, and the party hacks friggin know it.

So how do they counteract this unity factor? They quite dishonorably stick another L in libertarian, making it Liberaltarian. They control the Libertarian Party from the top down, in true collectivist fashion and centrally plan its demise. They make it so obviosly distasteful to its very namesake that people turn away from it worse than they do the traditional two party game.

Then, when they started to see a rise in the party because so many people are voting Libertarian in place of the absent "none of the above" vote, the controllers of the two party monopoly had to act again. Here comes the Green Party along with several others. The two partiers employed their same basic strategy of DIVIDE and then conquer.

Now, the Libertarian Party is established on most ballots around the country. The Ballot Access game has been overcome in large measure. Signature requirements matching the two main parties as example. So those bad actors are left with doing what they have always done in their own parties - control the candidate via media access. Literally install who they want, like Romney, Like Hillary.....wait for it.....Like Johnson.

By far and wide, the overwhelming vast majority of Americans just want to be left alone, to go about their own business without government poking them, shaking them down for money and being told what they can and cannot do - especially by permission slip. Americans by and large just want their rights, their Liberty, and have no interest in bothering others or forcing others to comply with their own petty demands. Indeed, most Americans really are small L...l...libertarian. Now, the only way to avoid a small libertarian person from winning election is to make sure the Libertarian Party candidate is not libertarian at all.

People have the right to be stupid, willfully ignorant, if they so choose. They must endure the consequences of their own choice, even if they are harsh. Government is not and cannot be tasked with protecting people from themselves, from their own stupidity.

Mental incapacity ya say? Don't discuss this "enough" eh? Imagine that, how libertarian of you to be the decider of what is "enough". Note - Remember when Obama said that, "at some point, a person has made ENOUGH money"? Notice the similarity to your comment, your use of "enough"? Ahem.

NOBODY is "qualified" to decide what is "damaging" to the "Atmosphere". Why? Because nobody knows what the perfect atmosphere IS in the first place, thus they are unable to say what is good or bad with authority to impose it upon another.

A true libertarian mindset would come to this conclusion - there is no basis for imposing any kind of tax or fee on something nobody can own in the first place. It is outside the parameters of government's purpose. You see, the free market is exactly what would 'protect' the environement in the first place.

Example - if a company is harming a water supply, actually polluting it, then harm is demonstrated. When harm is demonstrable, two things happen. One, a owner is held accountable for the harm they have done and two, people will choose to do business with that company or not. Choice. Free. Market.

In the event that stupid people enrich a company that poisons a river with plutonium, so be it. If they die in droves because of it, so be it. You see what happens as accountability is handed out? Stupid people are themselves weeded out. Their own choices leading to their own demise is a consequence they must endure.

See, a company cannot continue to harm people in demonstrable ways endlessly. Either they are bankrupted by the harm they did and are no more, or the stupid people die off and they go out of business because there are no more stupid people to do business with them and their harmful ways.

See how it works out int he wash, when there is no government in the front end - relegated to OUTSIDE private contracts? It works, and that shows that less government is better - something government fears to the core of their bones.

The free market is not a failure on any of those levels. The failure comes from trying anything BUT a free market trying to justify it by singing the sad sad song of "compassion for the mentally less capable".

Guess what? In a free market society, absent government interference, those who WANT to render aid to the less mentally capable will do so of their own volition. The failure is not recognizing this self evident solution and result of the free market unfettered.

Offtopic, but related, if you need the specifics on how CO2 GW is a farce, Dr. Salby does a fantastic job. His utilization of C14 and the nuclear test ban treaty to trainwreck the IPCC scam is the stuff of legend. But there's so much more, and its all as devastating to them.

I say anybody who agrees with a proposed tax or "fee" is looking to benefit somehow by it. This guy ain't no "Libertarian", but just another money-hungry politician who deserves nothing more than to be hanged along with the rest of them, when that day comes.

Aside from that, he's obviously never looked at the ice-core sample results indicating that global warming and cooling is a NATURAL cycle that's been going on far longer than people (of any kind) have been around, assuming anthropologist are correct (and I suspect they aren't). Besides, one good puff from any decent sized volcano puts out more CO2 or carbon than all the world's industries combined for a few years.

I guess he is to stupid to realize that CO2 is "tree food" along with rain water the trees store the carbon and release the oxygen for us humans to breath. Guess he never got the chance to go walking around in the woods after a summer shower and breath in the fresh clean air.

So, Johnson wants a "carbon fee", and plays the same tax vs fee game played with Obamacare, while his running mate, Bill Weld wants a task force to look at blocking some folks from buying guns, presumably without due process.

Does this sound like any "Libertarian" ticket you've heard of before? Sort of negates many of the Libertarian arguments that gave their party validity for those seeking an alternative party for a protest vote.

Just one more sign how strange this year as gone. Is there anyone left who thinks this election will fix anything?

He's no libertarian...never has been. He claimed he was for fiscal responsibility in his last campaign and was in debt the whole time. He's a failed Republican that ran as one last election cycle, couldn't garner enough support from the R party and then switched to L to try and get on the ballot...which he did...and gained around 1-2% of the total vote. He's a statistical zero and will only take votes away from anyone opposing Hillary.

I don't understand how poisoning the air and water human populations depend on for survival can be more permissible under libertarian theory than forming a tyrannical government to enslave those people.

I get that these activities are different, I just don't see the point of forbidding the latter if you'll permit the former. The reason big government is wrong is because it ruins everyone's lives. To the degree that the same thing was actually happening with pollution (which it is NOT), I'm personally very comfortable with opposing it.

Of course, I'm also willing to allow or even do it myself if I believe there is a compelling moral reason. Which there might be. But if libertarianism requires that we fight anything that is merely called one thing rather than another regardless of the provable effects of either, I don't believe anyone should be a libertarian.

As for Liberaltarians, that's a good one. It fills a hole in my vocabulary left by my refusal to say "left-libertarian" as if that was a real thing someone could be.

"Progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress."

I believe that liberty is the only genuinely valuable thing that men have invented, at least in the field of government, in a thousand years. I believe that it is better to be free than to be not free, even when the former is dangerous and the latter safe. I believe that the finest qualities of man can flourish only in free air – that progress made under the shadow of the policeman's club is false progress, and of no permanent value. I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave. -- H.L. Mencken

On the efficacy of passive resistance in the face of the collectivist beast. . .

Had the Japanese got as far as India, Gandhi's theories of "passive resistance" would have floated down the Ganges River with his bayoneted, beheaded carcass. -- Mike Vanderboegh.

In the future . . .

When the histories are written, “National Rifle Association” will be cross-referenced with “Judenrat.” -- Mike Vanderboegh to Sebastian at "Snowflakes in Hell"

"Smash the bloody mirror."

If you find yourself through the looking glass, where the verities of the world you knew and loved no longer apply, there is only one thing to do. Knock the Red Queen on her ass, turn around, and smash the bloody mirror. -- Mike Vanderboegh

From Kurt Hoffman over at Armed and Safe.

"I believe that being despised by the despicable is as good as being admired by the admirable."

From long experience myself, I can only say, "You betcha."

"Only cowards dare cringe."

The fears of man are many. He fears the shadow of death and the closed doors of the future. He is afraid for his friends and for his sons and of the specter of tomorrow. All his life's journey he walks in the lonely corridors of his controlled fears, if he is a man. For only fools will strut, and only cowards dare cringe. -- James Warner Bellah, "Spanish Man's Grave" in Reveille, Curtis Publishing, 1947.

"We fight an enemy that never sleeps."

"As our enemies work bit by bit to deconstruct, we must work bit by bit to REconstruct. Be mindful where we should be. Set goals. We fight an enemy that never sleeps. We must learn to sleep less." -- Mike H. at What McAuliffe Said

"The Fate of Unborn Millions. . ."

"The time is now near at hand which must probably determine, whether Americans are to be, Freemen, or Slaves; whether they are to have any property they can call their own; whether their Houses, and Farms, are to be pillaged and destroyed, and they consigned to a State of Wretchedness from which no human efforts will probably deliver them. The fate of unborn Millions will now depend, under God, on the Courage and Conduct of this army-Our cruel and unrelenting Enemy leaves us no choice but a brave resistance, or the most abject submission; that is all we can expect-We have therefore to resolve to conquer or die." -- George Washington to his troops before the Battle of Long Island.

"We will not go gently . . ."

This is no small thing, to restore a republic after it has fallen into corruption. I have studied history for years and I cannot recall it ever happening. It may be that our task is impossible. Yet, if we do not try then how will we know it can't be done? And if we do not try, it most certainly won't be done. The Founders' Republic, and the larger war for western civilization, will be lost.

But I tell you this: We will not go gently into that bloody collectivist good night. Indeed, we will make with our defiance such a sound as ALL history from that day forward will be forced to note, even if they despise us in the writing of it.

And when we are gone, the scattered, free survivors hiding in the ruins of our once-great republic will sing of our deeds in forbidden songs, tending the flickering flame of individual liberty until it bursts forth again, as it must, generations later. We will live forever, like the Spartans at Thermopylae, in sacred memory.

-- Mike Vanderboegh, The Lessons of Mumbai:Death Cults, the "Socialism of Imbeciles" and Refusing to Submit, 1 December 2008

"A common language of resistance . . ."

"Colonial rebellions throughout the modern world have been acts of shared political imagination. Unless unhappy people develop the capacity to trust other unhappy people, protest remains a local affair easily silenced by traditional authority. Usually, however, a moment arrives when large numbers of men and women realize for the first time that they enjoy the support of strangers, ordinary people much like themselves who happen to live in distant places and whom under normal circumstances they would never meet. It is an intoxicating discovery. A common language of resistance suddenly opens to those who are most vulnerable to painful retribution the possibility of creating a new community. As the conviction of solidarity grows, parochial issues and aspirations merge imperceptibly with a compelling national agenda which only a short time before may have been the dream of only a few. For many Americans colonists this moment occurred late in the spring of 1774." -- T.H. Breen, The Marketplace of Revolution: How Consumer Politics Shaped American Independence, Oxford University Press, 2004, p.1.